When is he knocking stuff off the counter and chewing it? When you're there or when you're gone? Where is the dog during the day when you're not around? Is he allowed to roam free and that gives him the power to do what he wants when he wants? If so, kennel his ass in a crate - kinda hard for them to tear shit up if they're not allowed access. If the dog is tearing shit up while you're standing there watching him? That's your fault for not correcting him in a reasonable manner that shows he's doing something 'right now' that's not allowed. If he doesnt stop .. roll him - alpha roll - cause he doesnt think you're in charge.
I assume you just let the dog be a dog? If so - I cant fix the problem. The problem is you.
The Dude is correct here! Crating a dog is not cruel, as a mater of fact they like it if it is not an unreasonable amount of time. Cyrus's is in his crate at night, he freely walks right into it when I snap off all the lights at 11pm every night. His Crate is the largest one made and it is in my office which is directly across from our bedroom. So he can look out of the front door and see our bedroom with the door open and hear us sleeping (or snoring) whatever!
. At 6am I get up and get dressed and take him out of the crate and into the backyard which is now fenced off. He "Gets Busy" real quick because he then knows he will hear "Breakfast Time" and he bullets for the back door! I feed him a half log of Bravo raw food which is 1lb and add in some grated carrots and a squirt of Alaskan Salmon oil. Sometimes I give him a fresh cracked egg with shell and all and sometimes I give him a scoop of low fat cottage cheese. Then it is time for the dog park. WE pile into the SUV and go on a 2 mile walk every morning on some deep woods trails where at the end we are in an open field and I rotate fetch on alternate days between a squeaky ball and a 2.5 lbs dumbbell. he then goes home, has a nice drink of clean water and back into the crate while m wife and I go to work. My wife works 5 min from home so she goes home every day and lets him out for an hour at lunchtime for a romp around the backyard and his daily vitamin and then back in the crate until 4pmish when she returns home from work. She plays with him and feeds him dinner. I get home around 6pmish and take over all night duties with him until it is bed time. We go for a few night time Ninja walks and always end up on the front porch with him sitting down between my legs and looking at into the night just listening while I massage his neck! Not a bad life at all if you ask me!
He now has his stitches out from crashing through the plate glass window and the "Cone of Humiliation" is now off! He is now 5 months old and just over 50lbs and a real good dog! His paperwork finally came in from Germany and it turns out that he is the Grandson of Tom van't Leefdaalhof, a world famous Schutzhund SchH 3 and that his entire bloodline is SchH 3 so he has a pretty decent gene pool swimming inside him!
The first thing he wanted to do after the cone came off was go for a walk -
A quick shout-out to my brother's dog Felina who is a breeder for "The Guiding Eyes for the Blind"
